The drive up to Ronda, at 2,370 feet, was very windy and a bit hairy, but worth it. Our first stop was for lunch at a restaurant with beautiful views of the canyon on which this white village sits atop. The New Bridge is the newest (finished in 1793) and largest (390 feet to the bottom) that spans the canyon. After lunch, we wondered through the historic city center.
One of the big draws of Gibraltar is the Barbary Macaques, the only wild primates in Europe. The apes have lived on the Rock for centuries, supposedly introduced by the Moors to be pets. Legend says that when the apes leave, Gibraltar will cease to be British. There are currently approximately 230 of the monkeys running around on the Upper Rock. They caught our attention as soon as we exited the cable car and we enjoyed spotting them along the paths back down into town.
This little monkey entertained us as he jumped around on a car, then surprised us as he first jumped onto Ashlynn, then onto Veronica. Is he searching for lice?
The kids wrote another script for a play this year, but after James bought a video camera, they decided to make a movie instead. They recruited the dads to be the bad guys, but wouldn’t tell Sally or me what the story was. They’d planned on filming entirely at the villa, but I encouraged them to film at different locations during our journeys. In addition to filming at Grand Casements Square, they also filmed in St. Michael’s Cave.
After lunch, we headed to the cable car to go to the top of the Rock, where we spent the next few hours walking back down. In addition to St. Michael’s limestone caves, we visited the ape den, a Moorish Castle and the Great Siege Tunnels from the 1780s. We had dinner at another British pub. I would have liked to have done some real tax-free shopping (as opposed to those silly stores at the airports), but all the stores had closed.
The views from the Upper Rock (which tops out at 1,398 feet) were very impressive. On the far side of the airport is Spain, who still smarts from losing possession to Britain in 1713. On a clear day, Morocco can be seen over the Straits of Gibraltar, but it was quite foggy. Approximately 40% of the country is a nature reserve where we spent several hours walking the hills and laughing at the folks stuck in traffic with the lines of tour vans.
After a few days of hanging out at the villa and walking to the local beach, it was time for an adventure. It was time to head to the UK. Strange that all we had to do was drive a little over an hour, park the car in Spain, and walk over the border and we were in the United Kingdom. Even stranger, to get to town, we had to walk across the runway of the Gibraltar Airport. As with all visits to Britain, we started with fish ‘n chips for lunch.
After spending four Easters at the Chateau with Sally, John, David and Andrew, we weren’t going to allow losing access to the Chateau to stop us from spending Easter together. We originally considered going to Ireland, then switched our sights towards Iceland. While I was in the US, Sally and John had an epiphany--Iceland’s still cold in April. Since being warm sounded better, they found a 4-bedroom, 4-bathroom villa to rent on Guadalmina Golf Course in the Costa del Sol area of Southern Spain. Our view overlooked the 17th hole.
The kids loved the backyard with its heated pool, ping pong table and pool table. They enjoyed playing a strange version of a scavenger hunt where they had to complete different tasks. Here David is directing a blindfolded Veronica to retrieve a ball from the pool. It’s always entertaining to see their imaginations at work.
Sally picked me up from the train station on my return to Holland so that I wouldn’t miss the AWC’s tour of the Dutch Royal Stables. First we swung by school to pick up Ashlynn so she could join along. The highlight of seeing the carriages was definitely being close to the Golden Coach (built in 1898) which the Queen rides on the opening day of Parliament. Ashlynn’s favorite part was seeing the horses, including posing with the Queen’s horse. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to see the modern aspect of the stables such as the limos and planes.
When my dad heard that I needed to go back to North Carolina, he instantly invited me to swing through California. Of course, I reminded him that it takes 8 hours to fly to San Jose and that it’s hardly on my way home, but how could I resist the chance to see my family. Not only was I able to celebrate Leigh’s 40th, but got to go shopping with Eden at the high-class Goodwill in Los Altos and to spend a day with Darlene. It was definitely a nice bonus and great way to end the trip.
When we checked our email the evening of the wedding in India, we received an urgent message from our property manager that we needed to contact them and our insurance company. Imagine our surprise when we found out that our tenant had been out of the country for five months and no one had winterized the house. During a hard freeze, a water pipe in the attic burst and water free-flowed down through the master bedroom/bathroom, guest bedroom/bathroom and into the basement for over two weeks causing $85,000 in damage! In mid-March, I flew to Cary to work with the contractor to pick out all the materials for the three bathrooms. It was strange seeing straight through to our bathroom from the living room. The good news is that this gave us the opportunity to redesign the master bedroom and to upgrade to cherry cabinets and granite. It also gave me an unscheduled 10 days to see friends, go to book club and to hash.
As soon as I suggested doing Thriller as a skit, Veronica volunteered to be Michael Jackson. Luckily, we were able to borrow red leather pants from a very skinny Hague hasher and a faux leather coat from another friend. We were too cheap to buy a black wig, so we sprayed her hair with temporary dye instead.
Jimmy was the big surprise guest as the King of Rock and Roll invited the King of Pop to join him in Heaven for a jelly donut party with Marilyn Monroe, Jimmy Hendrix and Jim Morrison. The audience was especially surprised as he threw donuts to the kids in the front rows. What a great ending to the show!
After Michael Jackson died, I thought it would be fun to do a tribute as the North American contribution to the International Family Event at school. I was inspired by a great version of Thriller at Carnival in Barcelona last year to see if we could put together our own interpretation. As I can’t really dance, I was lucky that Lauren was willing to choreograph the dance despite not being in town for the performance. She worked for several weekends with Ashlynn and Veronica and then for several days after school with the rest of the kids. Ashlynn took her role as head zombie very seriously and did a great job leading the rest of the zombies. I was happy that we didn’t get into trouble with the administration for trashing school uniforms for costumes.
Back in December, I volunteered to be photographed as part of the Exploring Beauty Project, a traveling art exhibit to explore the nature of beauty. American artist Erik Hagen is a trailing spouse who followed his wife when she was transferred to The Hague. Originally he put out a call for women over 40 to photograph and I decided to surprise Jimmy. It wasn’t until I saw his website that I realized what a prude I am as I was one of the few ladies that was fully clothed. He’s now planning on doing a book of his sessions--will be interesting to see if I make the cut.
